Job Hunting Hacks—Surviving and Thriving in a Competitive Job Market, Part II

Ask intelligent and well-considered questions during a job interview

• Interviewers ask law students and other applicants regularly whether they have "any questions." This is one of the greatest softball questions of all time—don't bungle it.
• Do not spend time asking generally what the interviewer is looking for—that should be obvious from your research about the firm and talking to others about it. If there are highly specific, technical requirements for a position, that is a valid topic for questions.
• Spend a good deal of time and effort thinking about and planning ways you might respond to the "any questions?" question. Say the words out loud to see how they feel—if there is the slightest hint of insincerity or pre-planning in your sample response, try out other wording.
• Practice your sample responses (no scripting) with friends, family, colleagues, and your career development office.
• Raise your game and the interviewer's estimations of you by asking sophisticated and relevant questions about the particular type of work or position you are seeking.

Example #1: Interviewer: Do you have any questions about the firm?

• Job Seeker: Yes, I've read about the firm's mission statement on its web site, so I'm familiar with some general information about the firm's current practice areas and specialties, I'd like to ask about the firm's mid-range plans in terms of practice growth and development—in other words, the areas of practice the firm has decided to support and fund during the next five years—mainly because I want to be sure that my experience, expertise, and training will be of value to the firm.
• Note: This precise question (with some variation in the wording) was recently asked by one of my students during interviews with two partners from a well-established U.S. law firm that does business internationally as well. One week after suggesting this question to the student, he informed me that the firm made him an offer of paid employment and that both partners with whom he interviewed told him they were highly impressed with the question. They told him that, in 20 or so years of interviewing law students, they had never received a question that reflected such an understanding of the way law firms work and evolve in terms of law practice areas.

Example #2: Interviewer: Do you have any questions about the firm?

• Job Seeker: Yes, I have read that the firm is going through a transitional phase with respect to growth, including a possible merger with another firm. What are the firm's current plans regarding such a merger and how would that affect the opportunities associated with the type of work I am looking for?

Example #3: Interviewer: Do you have any questions about the firm?

• Job Seeker: I understand from reading the firm's web site and from talking with some of my classmates who work at the firm that there are overseas offices. My BA degree was in Spanish and I'm available for travel assignments or long-term international assignments, as well as using my Spanish to assist with local and existing clients. I have read that you are expanding your work with companies in Mexico—can you tell me about the Spanish-speaking needs of your clients and whether there are opportunities to be based locally or in other places, according to the firm's needs?

Use your adjunct instructors

• Adjunct instructors are employed by law schools to create a bridge between the academic world and the working world. Adjuncts, by definition, are still practicing law or other specialized areas of work. Adjuncts know who's who in the community.
• Adjuncts are a largely untapped resource when, actually, they can provide a wealth of information about law practice, make introductions, and be a part of a real network.
• Full-time professors are excellent academics, but every year they teach on a full-time basis they tend to lose contact with the everyday life of a legal practitioner, e.g., what does a full-time professor know about e-filing of pleadings, e-discovery, current local court rules, who is the current presiding judge of the Superior Court, and current practices in law and motion.
• Don't restrict your use of adjunct instructors to instructors who have taught classes you have taken. Go through your school catalog of adjuncts, find one who teaches or practices in an area of law that interests you. Call them, put notes on their door, be a little pushy. You will find adjuncts who want to help and who are willing to spend some of their very valuable legal capital by sharing information with you about areas of law practice that present opportunities.
• When you spend some time with an adjunct instructor, ask them to talk about the local legal community, including which areas of practice are expanding, which areas are contracting, what firms are well-regarded and why, which lawyers are well-regarded and practicing the kind of law you find interesting, what connections does the adjunct instructor have with top practitioners in their field, and, of course, can the adjunct instructor help you make a connection with well-regarded lawyers in your community?

Make the most of your career and practice development office on campus

• You're feeling the pressure of law school, your time is precious, and you are bombarded by information in the process—you have the tendency to view emails and advice from the career and practice development office on campus as junk mail or just another obligation that you can't successfully fulfill. You've seen their offices on campus, but from the outside, they look just like another administrative office, which, to you, implies paperwork, bureaucracy and more work.?
• Resist all these tendencies, override your negative impulses, face the fear of failure and pop your head into one of their offices. You will be vastly impressed by the range of resources they can provide. And you won't feel like a number or like you're being "processed" through the law school sausage machine.
• Alumni comprise one of the most precious job-hunting resources available. Work with your career development office to identify well-regarded, generous, and supportive alumni.?
• The bond between alumni is so great that is can help you overcome less than sterling grades, lack of an Ivy League education, and other possible barriers to employment.??
• This is a group that, over time, will evolve and change due to practice demands, conflicts, time pressures and other life circumstances. So, stay in touch by periodically re-examining your career interests and updating your knowledge of alumni in your area. Don't think of your job search as a well-worn and traditional path you must trudge down begrudgingly.?
• Look to your law school alumni to help you ease into law practice (internships, unpaid clerking, paid clerking, various contract relationships).? The quality and creativity of your job search is going to determine the course of your life and career—what could be more important?
• Read and research about job hunting practices and pitfalls. Prioritize your time—spend less time surfing the Web and more time searching for resources and seeking help from knowledgeable people (your career development staff) that will make you a prime candidate for a job. There will always be time for mindless and entertaining times on the Web. Now is the time for you to make the most of your job search. If you decline to take advantage of a legal opportunity during summers, you may find that it is significantly more difficult to secure employment after law school.? Don't forget about externship programs to also get experience during the school year.
• Note that, once you fall out of the job-hunting cycle or get behind in your skills or miss a season of job hunting, it creates a noticeable gap in your resume and background. Employers care much more about applicants who care about their career, their progression, and the breadth of their skills. It is simple for an employer to assess which applicants have conscientiously and tenaciously pursued their personal and professional development.?
• You might think it is missed because taking a summer off does not appear in your resume. Employers read resumes for what they say and what they don't say. Hiding is not possible. Your competition is swimming at the peak of their capacity and walking the tightrope even with their fear of failure. Don't fall out of the job-hunting cycle or lose your edge by missing a single opportunity possible in every interaction with lawyers. Deliberately create and find events and activities where you will be interacting with people of quality and consequence.
• Job hunting is a process of rejection—until you find at least one opportunity that meets your needs. Get used to it, normalize it, assimilate it. The folks at the career development office can support you and provide assurances that rejection is a normal, foreseeable part of the process. They will help you develop an appropriately thick skin while you are maximizing your job-hunting skills.
• Being a strong candidate doesn't mean you are a good person and, therefore, you deserve a good job.?
• Becoming a strong candidate in the legal field takes planning, converting everyday social and work situations into job opportunities, and executing your plans. It is a long-term process of becoming someone who outshines your competition, is well-rounded, makes a good appearance, and is a person with whom the firm would be proud to associate. For everyone, a lot of rough edges will have to be smoothed out in the process.?
• Career development professionals can help you candidly, but gently, identify your career strengths and weaknesses. As in everything, focused and mindful attention must be given to the weaknesses; otherwise, we become the fastest pony on the track but only if the conditions are just right. The best horses run in all conditions and they are continually challenged to shore up their weaknesses. That applies to law students looking for a job, too.

Dress like they do—be a "mirror" of their overall "look"

• Law firms are governed by rules of behavior, dress, and values just like any other organization—each firm has its own "culture."
• Research the dress code for your prospective firm (carefully review photos of attorneys on the web site, talk with classmates who have visited the firm).
• Pay very close attention to dress rules and be conservative with high-status items such as expensive wristwatches, pendants, and jewelry.
• Be highly aware of the condition of your shoes (some lawyers and other business people have actually mentioned that an applicant will lower themselves in the estimation of the interviewer if their shoes are old, scuffed, unpolished, out of style, or otherwise inappropriate).
• Obviously, start-up firms with young partners may have very different dress customs than 50-year-old firms with partners ranging in age from 35 - 70-years-old.

Take the bull by the horns—job-hunting will force you to use every skill you have

• Job-hunting is an active—not passive—activity.
• Do your research—never interview at a firm you have not researched on the Web or talked up with friends and colleagues.
• Consider rejection and failure to be part of the normal job-hunting process (in a, perhaps, apocryphal story, when asked how he handled thousands of failures in the process of researching a way to create the filament for a light bulb, Thomas Edison is reputed to have said, "What failure? I simply learned thousands of ways that didn't work.").
• You are responsible for creating your own opportunities—don't wait for someone else or for your school to find job prospects for you (on-campus interviews can result in work opportunities, but there is a "cattle call" feel to them and they should not be relied upon as the sole or primary source of prospects).
• Failures, when viewed, analyzed, and honestly evaluated, can provide valuable insights into future prospects and opportunities. In other words, how would you handle a particular situation differently?

Talk it up

• Talk to your friends, classmates, and colleagues about ways they are looking for work.
• Talk to lawyers about ways they actually found their current job.
• Talk to your placement office to hear about success stories.
• Take full advantage of alumni lawyers (your placement office will have that information).
• Try not to fall into the harsh and usually unsuccessful practice of sending out resumes to law firms or companies with which you have had no prior contact ("cold calls").
• Try to avoid the temptation to complain about the job market and blame others for your lack of success in finding work; the reality is that jobs are always scarce and you have to work hard to crack open opportunities to find them.? Accept the challenges and current marketplace for what it is and work with it.

Don't wait

• Large firms have well-established and, at times, long-term hiring cycles.? Find out what they are. Often, they will interview and hire summer associates and law clerks in fall of one year for the summer period during the following year.
• Make use of your summers—don't goof off by spending all your time traveling, you don't "deserve" time off, you may need a break—but this isn't the time to take a 3-month vacay to just chill (recall that your classmates and cohorts are busy working and learning how to practice law while you are relaxing, resting, and getting nowhere in your job search).? Of course, a reasonable 1-2 week break at the beginning or end of summer may be just what is needed to maintain a healthy work/life balance.
• Work part-time, if possible, during school and take advantage of any externship programs.
• Do not wait until your last semester of law school to get serious about job-hunting.?
• Get focused on it now; this is one of the most important things you will do in your entire life. The way you start your law practice can make a significant difference in the quality of your long-term personal and professional life. You don't want false starts, generally you don't want to move into the highly limited world of lateral hiring, and you don't want to burn bridges. Everything you do while you are in school should be strategic and designed to build bridges between you and the legal community.?
• You've already invested a huge amount of time, energy and financial resources in law school. You've made personal sacrifices of all kinds, both large and small. Why bungle your opportunities by making bad decisions and not making the most of your future?
• Be imaginative and creative—always keep the wheels turning about finding a job from the first day of law school and every day after that. Keep a small notebook close by or make notes on your cell phone with your ideas. Don't lose track of your ideas or write them off as useless—that's just your doubting-Thomas subconscious questioning your choices.

Re-tool your resumé

• Class standing, GPA, and prestigious activities like law review only get you in the door; consider that most of your competitors (other law students) also will have sterling credentials and qualities.
• The value of a well-written resume is a real factor in hiring decisions by law firms.??
• Suggestion:? Have your resume reviewed by your career development office.??
• Spend time on activities where the return on investment is high (face-to-face meetings rather than a one-page summary of your life that is often thrown away, buried in a stack, or viewed merely as a minimum gate-keeping requirement).
• Spend less time on your resume than on face-to-face networking.
• Be imaginative—think every day about ways to get into a face-to-face or telephone contact with a real employer prospect.
• Throw away your resume if it is a brag sheet. Re-write the resume to appeal to the needs of the prospective employer.?
• Convert every statement and every word on your resume to fit the needs of the prospective law firm (which you can learn about by reading their mission statement on the Web, talking with lawyers and staff from the firm, talking with students and alumni who have worked there). It's easier to frame your skills and experience in terms that meet the law firm's interests than it is to extol your virtues in a vacuum.
• Hobbies and interests are included on some resumes—don't mention weird ones.
• Remember to update your resume—it is not a snapshot of your life and accomplishments, but a living document that reflects your evolving skills and experience.
• Employers may value lateral hires with special expertise, but beware of developing a work history that reflects "job hopping" in a short time frame on a repeated basis.